


Eyes Like an Impossible Storm

by waldorph



Category: Star Trek (2009)
Genre: Gen, POV Outsider
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-07-05
Updated: 2009-07-05
Packaged: 2017-10-07 03:31:06
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,073
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/60971
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/waldorph/pseuds/waldorph
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"She thinks that maybe in another universe, one where ships didn't come out of lightning storms in space, she would have had a brown-eyed, steadier child"</p>
            </blockquote>





	Eyes Like an Impossible Storm

**Author's Note:**

  * Translation into 中文 available: [Eyes Like an Impossible Storm [translation]](https://archiveofourown.org/works/1501817) by [Navi](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Navi/pseuds/Navi)



> Translated [into Mandarin](http://ninvolati.blogspot.tw/2013/10/st-eyes-like-impossible-storm.html) by [Navi](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Navi).

All caucasian babies have gray-blue eyes, so she thinks nothing of Jim's eyes at first. George Jr's eyes were that same foggy color when he was born; no cause for notice, and she has more important things to worry about- receiving George's honors for him, awarded posthumously. She has to resign her comission so she can stay home with George Jr., who is four and doesn't _quite_ understand, but understands enough. She moves back to Iowa, and there's nothing in Iowa but corn, but George always said it would be a good place to raise kids.

The only thing is, she has brown eyes, her parents had brown eyes, and George's parents had brown eyes; the likelihood of Jim having brown eyes is roughly 73%; George Jr has brown eyes, after all.

It's a bit of a shock when by age two the blue hasn't darkened. George had blue eyes, but Jim doesn't have George's eyes; eyes like Earth's sky in the middle of summer on a clear day—eyes that warm and seemed so _steady_ even when they sparkled with laughter. No, Jim has impossible, electric blue eyes. Eyes that, when she peers into them in the right light seem to contain lightning.

Like that storm. Like that goddamn storm.

And Jim is _like_ that storm in so many ways. He's too clever, too unexpected. He lives too fast, even as a child, he's always falling down. He runs before he crawls.

When he goes to school she's relieved in a way she can't imagine having been when George Jr went. Then she was sad to lose him, and now she's so happy that Jim is someone else's problem.

But he's Jim, and the school systems can't handle him, and it puts such a strain on her marriage that Frank tells her that she has to choose between him or Jim.

She sends Jim to Tarsus IV to visit George's uncle and his family, and tries not to feel happy as she watches his retreating back.

Six months later she gets Jim back, a survivor of a genocide (because Jim will always survive), and he's angrier than ever and even more broken, but now he's dangerous in a way he never was before.

George Jr isn't an angry child. He gets along fine with Frank; never would think to steal a vintage car and drive it over a cliff, doesn't drink or stay out all nights.

She sends him away to private school and he gets perfect grades.

Jim graduates early (possibly because his teachers can't bear to keep him) and seems to take up residence at the local bar at 17.

When he yells (and he always yells back, never accepts punishment like a good son), she always imagines (knows) that she can see that storm in his eyes; that murderous, unnatural storm in the middle of space that killed her husband.

She can't help but want to run from him.

She thinks that maybe in another universe, one where ships don't come out of lightning storms in space, she would have had a brown-eyed, steadier child with a penchant for mischief, who would have been still clever but whom she could have sent off to Starfleet Academy knowing he would do both her and his father proud.

A son who would be a golden-child, who would make George Jr the problem child. A son who would get his own commission, explore strange new worlds, rather than the one she has who buys condoms in bulk and is always so drunk.

Some days, when Frank was screaming at Jim and Jim was screaming right back at him, she wished for that universe. Some days, even now, she still wishes for it. A universe where George would be alive, and they would all be a family, and she wouldn't keep needing to run- to flee across space as if she could leave her troubles behind her.

As if she could leave this blue eyed monster of a boy who is too smart; too _quick_ behind her, outrun even the memory of him.

She last sees him when he's 20. Two years later she recieves a message from Chris Pike, telling her that Jim enrolled in the Academy. There's quiet judgement in his message, that she let her genius son rot in a bar in Iowa.

She gives Chris three months before he wants to run from Jim.

But apparently Chris doesn't, and Jim thrives, because even though she doesn't get cards, she also never gets requests for money. George Jr says he hears from Jim occasionally, but not often. He gets a note of congratulations and a gift when he gets married, but Jim doesn't come, though George Jr tells her that he did extend an invite.

And then Vulcan is destroyed, and Earth nearly follows, and there is a singularity right in Earth's solar system for a brief moment before the crew of the U.S.S. Enterprise manages to collapse that with an explosion of perfectly balanced positive energy.

She sits next to Frank, watching the broadcasts try to piece together what happened with what little they have; Chris Pike was the captain, his XO was a Commander Spock, a Vulcan.

But the man who emerges first isn't Chris Pike, it's Jim Kirk.

He waves off the reporters, turns to where another man, a few years older, is carefully carrying Chris down the stairs, with a Vulcan supporting him.

And then the crew that comes off first (and she was on Starships, she knows that the ones who come off first, that's the Primary Bridge Crew—the most important people on the ship). They are so, so young.

Chris says something, and Jim takes the Vulcan's place, leaning in and murmuring something before looking up at the cameras with a wry expression.

And then, even as she is being recalled back to Earth from Esanna VII, she cannot turn on any broadcast without his face being there, bruised and cut with a fat lip and a necklace of bruises. But it's those eyes, those blue eyes that stare through the camera and seem to find every one of them—every one in the galaxy wanting.

"—heroes," the reporter is saying. "Captain James T Kirk and his XO Commander Spock are set to give a joint press conference today, and Lt. Nyota Uhura will be issuing a statement about the Romulan message she translated, and the need for Romulan to be mandatory at Starfleet Academy. More on this at 1900 hours."

"Additionally, Captain Christopher Pike, who was captain when the Enterprise set off not two days ago, has issued a recommendation today that all charges be dropped against Cadet James Kirk, with a letter of support from the entire _Enterprise_ crew, notable among them Commander Spock, who launched an academic investigation into Kirk's behavior during a test known as "The Kobayashi Maru"."

When Winona wakes up after dozing, another reporter is still talking about them.

"James T Kirk will be celebrated tomorrow for his heroism, along with a ceremony which recognizes the work of the entire _Enterprise_ crew. It may interest viewers to know that the average age on the _Enterprise_ is 27, with the youngest member, Ensign Chekov, being 17. The soon-to-be Captain is 25, and his expected, but not yet confirmed, First Officer, Commander Spock, is 28, quite young indeed for a Vulcan. The eldest member of the crew is Nadia Selenov, a member of the engineering crew. She is 37."

Winona gets a room in a hotel, lets Starfleet Command know she's here. She sits down, and prepares to be cordial with a son she's always run from.

Chris Pike is nearly glowing with pride during the celebration, but Winona is more surprised by the way Jim seems to unfold under it, smiling at Chris (who is paralyzed) with an almost boyish glee.

He turns to accept his due, and the room seems to adore him.

They barely know him; that must make it easy.

The reception is crowded, and she shakes hands with old colleagues, smiles and laughs with Admirals who were only Ensigns when she knew them.

Accepts their memories of George as though he's not a quarter-century dead.

She's making her way closer, because if she doesn't people will speculate and wonder.

She maintains a distance, working on her flute of champagne and her courage.

Jim turns to a man—the man who carried Chris from the shuttle— and says "Bones, I totally owe you my firstborn for the misuse of vaccinations."

"Jim," the man, whose name cannot possibly be "Bones", replies, looking pained, "I don't _want_ your Goddamn first-born."

The group of people around them laughs, Lt Uhura rolling her eyes and sipping her wine, her bangles jingling pleasantly together. She is a lovely young woman. The other men are still laughing amongst themselves, while a blonde woman puts her hand on "Bones" shoulder and teases him about something. The Vulcan—Spock, she remembers that— turns to bend to hear something Jim is murmuring, and then he raises an eyebrow.

For Vulcans, that's practically a mating ritual.

"Winona!" Admiral Collins says as he walks up to her. "I'm so glad you made it! He's a fine boy, your son."

"He's a credit to his father's memory," she lies. George would be appalled by the easy way Jim takes a flute of Nerandese wine from the passing tray.

Commander Spock deftly plucks it from his fingers, depositing it on the same tray.

"You're on duty," he informs Jim, when Jim stares at him, aghast. Uhura covers her smile by drinking from her own flute. "He's your problem now," the Lt. observes with a wicked smile, and Winona stills at what that implies, because it is an _enormous_ conflict of interest and against umpteen regulations. But then, Commander Spock has not yet signed on to the _Enterprise_ crew, and this might be why. "Good luck, Commander."

Spock lifts an unamused eyebrow at her, and then Jim's eyes (restless, so restless) pass over Winona, causing her to shudder.

"Excuse me," she says, knowing that now that she's been seen she must go greet her son, instead of hovering.

"Jim," she says, trying to infuse her voice with warmth, holding out her arms.

"Mom," he replies easily, hugging her and releasing her quickly. "Mom, this is Lt. Uhura, Commander Spock, Ensign Chekov- Spock, it's not even _legal_ for Chekov to drink and you're letting him?"

"If Mr. Chekov makes a fool of himself, which is improbable, given his experience with alcohol and his cultural background, then the press will not seize upon that. Neither will it endanger his commission."

Her son gives the Vulcan a wounded look, and then continues introductions. "This is Lt. Sulu, and this is Bones. I mean, Dr. McCoy." Jim pauses thoughtfully, then amends with a snicker: "_Leonard._ The lovely lady is Christine Chapel, our head nurse, and Scotty is— where is Scotty?"

"I presume Mr. Scott is hiding from Admiral Archer," Spock replies. Jim laughs at that, and she squeezes his hand lightly.

"I'm very proud of you," she says. "Your father would be too."

"Thanks, Mom," he says. It is all a play they are performing for strangers; there is no warmth here.

Later, she will watch as Commander Spock leads her son from the room as the old Vulcan watches with an almost wistfully indulgent smile; she hadn't realized that Vulcans were expressing emotions these days. She goes to the balcony and watches their hands slide together, the flash of her son's teeth bright in a smile, Spock's head descending for a kiss.

She turns away before she can see it, goes back to her own part of the galaxy as her son becomes a rising star.

Jim is a golden child even when he's driving all of the Federation mad; the _Enterprise_ is the best ship out there, her crew the finest—this is common knowledge.

Commander Spock signed on, but no one raises charges of emotional compromise due to the fact that the captain and his XO are lovers.

George Jr and his wife and kids come over to visit her and Frank for holidays, and Jim becomes that thing they talk about; the boy who never fit in, and whom they would all like to pretend is a stranger.

As the years go by, that fantasy becomes reality.


End file.
